Transportation to Australia reached its maximum between 1787 and 1868, with 166,000 prisoners sent to its many convict stations. Australia was at the time a vast area, inhabited only by Aboriginal peoples, who were rapidly forced away from the most sheltered and most fertile coastal areas. From the point of view of the colonists, everything had to be built, starting with ports, houses, roads, colonial farms, etc. The convicts were often from the lower classes; women accounted for 16% of the total, and there were also quite a few children, who could be punished with transportation from the age of nine.
The Australian convict system took different forms in order to meet its many objectives. It evolved out of a great debate in Europe at the turn of the 19th century about how to punish crime and the social role to be given to the transportation of prisoners. The discussion included on the one hand the notion of punishment and on the other the desire to discourage crime through the idea of rehabilitation of personal behaviour by means of work and discipline. Transportation of a labour force to serve colonial development, especially in the more distant lands, was seen as a useful and effective response to these various social issues in England, as well in other European countries such as France and Russia.
In the Australian case, the convict system was in practice also designed to make the prisoners fully fledged colonists once they had served out their sentences. The considerable distance between Europe and Australia meant that that the convicts almost always remained after their release.
The Australian convict system included a variety of prison systems, ranging from outdoor to indoor work, from probationary transportation to simple imprisonment; it included convict stations for women or children (Cascades Female Factory and Point Puer). In some convict stations, the prisoners lived alongside free settlers (Brickendon and Woolmers Estates). Living conditions were naturally very strict, but they were variable in terms of their harshness, depending on the site and function.
Overseeing and transporting the convicts also required the presence of a sizeable prison administration, the organization of a specialized fleet, the presence of numerous guards, etc.
The most harsh stations, for those prisoners considered to be the most dangerous, included a prison, hard and often dangerous labour, corporal punishment, such as lashes or deprivation, and solitary confinement. Most sites had a prison and a solitary confinement area; but others were punishment stations, such as Norfolk Island, Port Arthur, and the Tasman Peninsula Coal Mines. These stations were renowned throughout the entire British Empire for their harshness, in order to maintain the fear of transportation among the population and so reduce crime in Great Britain and its colonies
The convict gang system was used for public works, especially for roads and port facilities. They were generally very strict and the work was hard. Examples include Old Great North Road, Hyde Park Barracks, Port Arthur, Coal Mines, Kingston and Arthur's Vale Historic Area, and Fremantle Prison.
There were also labour convict stations for those prisoners considered to pose less of a threat, where the convicts were made available for private projects, often farming. The entrepreneurs used them at their own risk. Examples include Brickendon and Woolmers Estates and Old Government House. Female labour was more of a manufacturing nature, such as Cascades Female Factory, a textile mill. These were, of course, still prisons with a system of punishment and rewards. Some convict stations used women as servants - for example, on farms and Old Government House.
Those convicts who behaved themselves could earn a lighter sentence, gradually leading to their early release. In the very vivid minds of the social reformists of prisoners, the aim was to establish a probationary path that would gradually lead to social rehabilitation through labour and, finally, to the status of fully fledged colonial settler.
The creation of convict stations in Australia, at the heart of the programme of creating colonies, had particularly negative effects on the Aboriginal peoples. This led to social unrest, forced migration, and the loss of fertile land, as well as devastating epidemics because of their lack of immunity. Conflict and resistance were frequent occurrences as settlers and convicts arrived, often resulting in death.
The penal settlements continued for quite a long time after the transportation system was abolished, up until the eve of World War II, driven by their own dynamic of prisoner management and similar practices, though applied on a far lesser scale, such as exile.
The last of the sites to remain in active use was Fremantle Prison, which closed in the early 1990s.Today; most of these sites are entirely or in part places of remembrance, museums, or parks.
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